


i found love where it wasn't supposed to be

by legendarytozier



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe, IT is in Eddie's head, Self Harm, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 11:10:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14617179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/legendarytozier/pseuds/legendarytozier
Summary: "I'll use you as a warning signThat if you talk enough sense then you'll lose your mindAnd I'll use you as a focal pointSo I don't lose sight of what I want"All Eddie wants is to feel something.





	i found love where it wasn't supposed to be

Eddie sat silently in the window sill of his room, peering out at the snow falling silently. His feet were tucked underneath him, fuzzy socks and an oversized sweater keeping him warm against the bitter cold. A small hand ran over the window pane, the ice seeping through his fingers. It was almost painful, the freeze he felt, but it made him feel good.

It made him feel a little alive.

Eddie reached out through the small crack he had managed to make from pulling tirelessly on the nails bolting the window down, and let the snowflakes settle on his fingertips. It was such a small thing, such a tiny gesture, to feel the snow melt on his palm, but a small grin cracked across his mouth anyways. It was rare that Eddie ever smiled anymore. There was a time that he lived contentedly with the overbearing protection his mother gave him, but now it left him with an uneasy sort of sickness in his stomach. He wished to play with the kids down below, to run through the snow, to bask in the sun, to live his life how he wanted.

Edward Kaspbrak had spent his entire life living entirely under this roof, with his mother has his only other human interaction. Sure, the doctor came to visit him once a week, every Wednesday, but he was just as cruel and spoke to his mother of all the things that could _maybe_ be wrong with him, like Eddie wasn’t sitting right there. His father had passed away when he was very small, and his mother refused to discuss it, yelling at him that he should never bring it up, and that he didn’t love her for doing so when he was a mere seven years old.

So Eddie didn’t. He never asked again.

_What are you looking for? Grownups are the real monsters._

Eddie shook his head roughly. The voices were coming more frequently now, more intrusive than before. As his sixteenth birthday crept closer and closer, it was beginning to feel like Eddie was cracking right at the seams. His pale skin was splitting into tiny fissures, and they were growing, and it was a terrible darkness seeping out now, not the beautiful sunshine that seemed to come from other kids in the street below. He didn’t know anything about mental illness, but his mother and doctor sure liked to remind him how sick in the head he was. And Eddie felt it, too. He didn’t have anyone but himself to talk to, and talk he did. Well, sort of. The voices were pretty one sided, and Eddie tried his hardest not to respond, but those voices… they often made a lot of sense. And they sounded so sweet, so tempting.

Eddie knew, subconsciously, they could convince him to do anything.

A sharp sting on his outstretched hand spooked him, and Eddie was pulled out of his internal monologue, snapping his hand back from the window close to his body. He had never felt that sensation before. In fact, Eddie had never felt even the slightest bit of pain, ever in his life. It was part of his mother’s pact to keep him safe; Eddie never got hurt. Not even the slightest scratch. He had never seen his blood, his bones, a bruise, nothing. This new feeling was strange, and shocking, and… good. Eddie finally pulled his hand from his chest, and admired the dry skin, where a small red line was itching to break. He knew he should put lotion on, that would fix everything. He’d be better again, that was what his mother had taught him. This was a very easy fix, just a little chapped skin from the cold winter air.

_We lie best when we lie to ourselves, is that what you’re looking for?_

“Get out!” Eddie whisper yelled, to his own brain, still gingerly holding his hand. But the voice was right; he was lying to himself. Eddie wasn’t broken, and the small injury barely made him feel anything at all. This wasn’t the end of the world. He turned his eyes down to admire the cracked skin, how it was so close to being broken. If he clenched his hand now, it would tear, and he would bleed. He knew this, he may have never been damaged in any way, but he knew what happened when normal people got a real injury. They bled, and they bled, and they _hurt_. Eddie felt a small tingle in his spine, a drive, a rush of something that moved him towards doing the unthinkable.

He wanted to hurt.

Taking a deep breath, Eddie spoke to himself softly.

“You can do this,” he said, and gently closed his fist. The dry skin cracked, and what sprung forth sent Eddie tumbling to the ground. Blood! The smallest of droplets, but it was there, and it was real, and it was coming from within him.

Part of it made Eddie dizzy, and sick, and he wanted to take it back, but another part of him was curious. This was his body, the inside arising to the out. It stung, but it made him feel more alive than he had since he was born. He felt so real, so human, in that very moment, that it made every other aspect of is life seem dull and meaningless. A sudden wave crashed over Eddie, letting him feel so many things at once. This is what life was about! Feeling! Eddie hadn’t even been sure he knew how to feel, no pain or love or happiness ever in his life, but this made him know. He was human, too, he had a body, a soul, _feelings,_ just like the kids in the street, or the people on his mother’s terrible soap opera’s. All from a simple split in his skin. Eddie pushed away all the fear and disgust that he had felt before, and simply admired the small streak of red on his body. It was so strange, and foreign, and interesting, Eddie simply couldn’t tear his eyes away. He didn’t feel like he was dying, like his mother told him he possibly would if he got hurt. He felt good, really good, a strangely euphoric feeling in his veins. Why had his mother been so deadest against letting him experience this?

_What are you looking for? A child blind from birth doesn't even know he's blind until someone tells him._

“That makes sense, I guess,” Eddie whispered quietly. Eddie knew he shouldn’t be talking back to the voices, the doctor himself had told him it was a terrible thing to do, but Eddie had to share this experience with someone. And the only someone around was himself, and his voices. He had to be quiet, Eddie didn’t want his mother to find him like this. She would force him into bed for the next two weeks, the doctor would come every day, and he would be belittled, as usual. Eddie couldn’t take that, not when he had tasted reality. He wanted more, and more, and more.

Rising slowly from the cold hardwood, he made his way out his door and down the stairs. He kept his hand hidden in his long sleeve, but it didn’t matter anyways. His mother was snoring loudly in her recliner, the TV flickering softly, illuminating her worn face. Eddie could see himself in her, and it terrified him. The last thing he ever wanted to be was his overbearing, sad, angry mom. Would Eddie ever even get to be a parent? Would his mother ever let him go, be his own person? He continued his journey into the kitchen, feeling a new rush of anger hit him, and looked around for something he could utilize. His mother had wrapped up and baby proofed every little thing in the house, so Eddie’s options were very limited. He finally thought of the singular knife his mom kept, in a drawer beside the sink. He pulled it open, and spied it, tucked to the side, the blade covered by a protective cover. He grabbed it as quietly as possible, and carefully closed the drawer again. He crept ever so carefully back up the stairs, and into his bedroom. Silently shutting the door, wishing he had a lock, Eddie turned to place his body back onto the floor. He wasn’t sure what he was doing, but Eddie was so blinded by his own thoughts and this new feeling, he wasn’t thinking straight at all. Eddie let the thoughts guide him, teach him the things he needed to do. He wasn’t in control anymore.

_I know what you’re looking for. It was easier to be brave when you were someone else._

That was the truth, and Eddie felt braver than ever, letting whoever was in his head guide him. Slipping the cover off the knife, Eddie admired his reflection in the shiny metal. He looked sickly, deranged, crazy. But he felt better than he had in his 15 years of life. He let the voices show him, telling him to flip his wrist, the exhilaration in him climbing higher and higher, until Eddie was almost blind. He pressed the tip of the blade to his wrist, but he paused, hesitant. A small nagging part buried deep inside him was yelling, telling him to stop. But the voices spoke higher.

_Eddie, what are you looking for?_

A sigh escaped Eddie’s lips, and he blinked slowly. “Feeling. I am looking for a feeling,” he said so softly, eyes blown to the point of psychosis, and Eddie could feel any uneasiness about this slipping away. He dug the knife in, and pulled back, gasping softly at the pain it elicited. But what really shook Eddie was the dark stream of blood that flowed from his wrist onto the hardwood below. It was thick, and came fast, and it was so very, very warm, but Eddie was so overwhelmed by the new sensation, he couldn’t even acknowledge what he had done. As the blood dripped from his body, and a few minutes had passed by, Eddie looked down to see something strange appearing below him.

Flowers. Red, beautiful flowers, growing silently out of the floor, reaching up to brush his face. Eddie let them touch his cheeks, brush his hair away from his face, curl around his ears. They whispered to him, telling him things no one had ever told him. They loved him, they loved him, _they loved him._ They radiated a warmth that Eddie had never known. Those few moments gave him more than his mother ever had. All of a sudden, the flowers slowed, leaning farther away from Eddie’s face, and he whimpered softly, reaching blindly for their touch.

“More, please…” Eddie said softly, begging the flowers to come back to him. They leaned farther, shrinking, dying before him. _No, no, no!_ Eddie needed those flowers, they were his comfort, his new friend, his feeling.

“Please come back,” Eddie cried, tears now slipping from his bewildered eyes. He tipped the blade to his other wrist, pressed even harder than before, and let blood slip from there, too. As he clenched his hand and forced more blood to the floor, the flowers grew again, arising from their death to kiss Eddie’s cheeks once more. He sighed in contentment, feeling warm and fuzzy all over, despite the cold winter air carrying snow through his window. Eddie felt more alive than he had in his whole life, and he never wanted the feeling to end.

As he laid back to the ground, Eddie felt all the things he had been missing. The comfort and love he should have received from his mother, the happiness and kindness he could have had from friends, the guidance and strength he would have received from his father. Eddie felt more cherished than he ever had. The flowers grew over him, hugging him close, warming him all over, whispering to him all that he wanted to hear. They covered his whole body, telling him to let go, to slip away with them. The flowers would take care of him, he needn’t worry anymore. Things were finally going to be okay. Eddie knew he would never be able to say no to something so enticing. Someone wanted _him_ , they wanted him to be happy.

“I have found what I’m looking for,” Eddie whispered softly to himself, and he let the flowers carry him away.

When Eddie’s mother found him, there were no flowers, there was no warmth. Just Eddie; cold, alone and silent.

As she gripped at his body and shook him violently, Eddie did not feel anything at all.

**Author's Note:**

> Based on this prompt --> https://writing-prompt-s.tumblr.com/post/173393957426/your-parents-have-always-been-protective-of-you  
> Song: I Found - Amber Run


End file.
